


I needed to feel you to believe

by Camelittle



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, De-Aged Merlin, Drabble, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Canon, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-28
Updated: 2015-09-28
Packaged: 2018-04-23 19:51:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4889935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Camelittle/pseuds/Camelittle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Arthur confronted a pesky kid who kept following him around, he got more than he bargained for.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I needed to feel you to believe

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Reunion Romance and De-Aged squares on my Merlin Writers Tropes Bingo card.

_Eight_

*

The boy was there again.

Staring at him, with that shining-eyed, unblinking expression that made it look as if Arthur was the answer to all his prayers. He’d have found it creepy if it hadn't been for the fact that the boy couldn't have been more than eight years old.

It wasn't the first time Arthur had seen him, peeping round corners and staring through shop windows as if looking desperately for something, and then exhaling suddenly, shoulders relaxing as if in release, when his searching eyes found Arthur.

Well, he’d just about had enough of it. Squaring his shoulders, Arthur tossed back the remains of his latte, shoved the documents he’d been intending to read back into his suitcase, and stood up to leave the cafe.

But in the time it had taken him to find his coat, the boy had vanished. It was as if he had some uncanny instinct for when Arthur was fed up with him. Him and those huge blue eyes, so full of hope. Arthur didn’t need the burden of yet another person’s expectations on his shoulders. He had enough of that already from his father. It was time to find out why the kid was there, and return him to his people. Whoever they might be.

Thus resolved, he strode out onto the busy London street and scanned left and right, just in time to see a diminutive figure vanish around a corner. Arthur followed him at a sprint, without another thought.

“Got you,” he crowed a few minutes later, grabbing onto a skinny, squirmy shoulder. The boy had scooted into a quiet passage behind a bunch of fried chicken outlets, and there was no way out. The scent of frying filled the air.

“Lemme go!” said the boy, face pink and furious as he struggled in Arthur’s grip.

“Not before you tell me who you are and why you are following me. Shouldn't you be at school?”

“Let me go, you bullying prat!”

But Arthur didn't. Instead, he held twisted the boy round, and encircling him with both arms, lifted his wriggling body into the air.

“Put me down!” screamed the boy, thrashing about ineffectually.

“All right, all right, I’ll put you down. And then I’m going to take you to the police, and you can talk to them about why you’re not at school, and why you keep following me around. London’s not safe for little kids on their own.”

“I can look after myself.” The kid stopped squirming and his little body went limp.

“I used to think that at your age,” said Arthur, putting him down with a relieved sigh. “But now I know better. There are bad people out here, kid. What’s your name?” He crouched down, so that he could look into the boy’s eyes.

“Mer… Merlin,” stuttered the kid, wiping the back of his nose with his hand, eyes darting hither and thither as if looking for escape. “Please, don’t take me to the police. I can explain.”

“Right. Well, explain then. Merlin.” Arthur consulted his watch. His patience was running low, and his lunch hour was rapidly disappearing, but he had to solve this mystery, he had to. He didn't know why his heart was pounding and his breath coming so fast. Something important was happening, something he didn't understand. “Now would be good.”

There was something oddly familiar about the lopsided set of Merlin’s shoulders, and the unruly hair that settled around his jutting-out ears. And most of all, about his eyes. They were an unsettling shade of blue, fathomless like the ocean. They looked much older than they should, for a child of his age. It struck Arthur that maybe he was a street child, who had seen far too much.

When those impossibly blue eyes started to swim with tears, and a frightened sob jerked Merlin’s shoulders, he felt a sudden pang of sympathy. Mixed with something else that he couldn't quite identify, but felt oddly like recognition.

“I've seen you somewhere before,” he said, forehead creasing. “Where do I know you from?”

“We were friends, once,” said Merlin, voice jerking between sobs. “A long time ago. And now you’re back. I missed you so much. I hadn't used it for so long, you see. I went too far. And now I’m so little. But I’m still me, and you’re still you. And you’re back! I waited for so long!”

Arthur wasn't prepared for it when a small body flung itself at him, wrapping insistent arms round his neck, and pressing his little nose into Arthur’s shoulder. After a moment he felt the tension leaking from his on shoulders and held on.

“Hush,” he said, pressing his face to Merlin’s hair. And it was that, rather than anything else, the simple scent of Merlin’s hair, that peeled away the centuries. Arthur’s breath hitched and his mind swam. “It’s me. I’m here now.”

“You were gone for so long. I couldn't… you can't leave me. Not again.”

“Shh.” Gentling Merlin’s head with trembling fingers, he knelt heavily on the uncaring London pavement while Merlin held on for dear life. Waiting. Waiting for his dizziness to settle, and for Merlin to stop shivering. “It’s all right,” he said, over and over again through his whirling thoughts. “I’m here. I’m back. I’m not leaving you.”

“Never letting you go again, clotpoll.” Sniffing noisily, Merlin tilted his head on one side and cupped Arthur’s chin in tiny fingers.

Arthur’s heart swelled at these words.

“I’m not going anywhere, idiot. And just how have you managed to bespell yourself into a kid’s body? You bumbling incompetent.”

“You try shedding fifteen hundred years, you arrogant prat.” Nuzzling into Arthur’s neck, Merlin’s shoulders heaved in another sob, and with a shock, Arthur realised that he was shivering.

“Let’s get you somewhere warm and try to work out how to remedy matters.” The cold seeped through his work trousers, but his chest filled with warmth. He curled his arms around Merlin, possessively, and heaved himself to his feet, which was not easy. Not with a thousand-plus-year old sorcerer, albeit one trapped in an eight year old body, clinging to his neck.

And later, in Arthur’s poky little Islington flat, Merlin lay down on his sofa, exhausted, swaddled in layers of blankets and reassurance. As Arthur watched, overcome with an odd sense of tenderness, eventually Merlin’s eyelids fluttered closed, sooty lashes fanned out along his chubby, tear-stained cheek. His breathing slowed.

*

_ Twenty-Eight _

The next morning, when Arthur awoke, it was to be greeted by a very man-sized but nonetheless clingy sorcerer, crawling into his bed.

“It is you,” Merlin whispered. Long fingers stroked every inch of Arthur’s face, as if it was only by touching that Merlin could bring himself to believe it.

“Merlin! I can’t believe I didn’t remember, didn't recognise...” Chest heaving, Arthur couldn’t take his eyes off Merlin’s adult face. Such love flooded through him that he thought he might explode from the joy of it. “Oh, God, Merlin. Thank God you’re a man, again. Thank God! Never do that to me again, you complete buffoon!”

“All right, as long as you promise not to die on me again!” Merlin’s sly smile was still like the Spring. It always had been. Arthur couldn’t take his eyes off it. “Are you all right? My king.” Eyes shining, Merlin inched forward, so that their foreheads touched,

“I might ask you the same, my sorcerer.” Closing the final distance between them, closing his eyes against the light of hope that shone from Merlin’s eyes, Arthur pressed their lips together with a sense of homecoming.

“Yes,” murmured Merlin without moving, so that his lips moved against Arthur’s, drawing them open.

*

*End*  
  
  



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